Metoprolol as needed??

I was wondering if anyone out there was using Metoprolol for their SVT on an as needed basis??? I have SVT and was started out on this drug and took it for a few months. With ok from my doctor I quit taking it. I hadn't had any episodes for about 6 months then I had one last night while I was sleeping. And it was a bad one, the kind where you think your gonna die. :( My doctor had told me that some people can take Metoprolol on an as needed basis. Thanks!

I think it depends on which brand you're using. Some of them are in "slow release" formula (so a dose of say 25 mg is released through 24 hours) and will not work as a "pill in the pocket".

I have a beta blocker for use when needed, but that one is propranolol and not metoprolol (slow release). Propranolol works better towards anxiety, stress and other factors that may trigger a rapid heart rhythm. From time to time (generally stressful times) I can take 12,5 or 25 mg metoprolol in addition.

But I guess this is something that your doctor should decide as we are all different.

I've received two different instructions from my family physician, and my cardiologist. The former put me on 100mg/day and told me that if I had an SVT event, to chew on one, and that it would help in converting it. When I told my cardiologist, he politely told me that "it doesn't work that way". So take your choice. Regardless, I found Metoprolol ineffective in preventing episodes, which in my case had grown to 3 to 5 times per month. I do think however that the drug helped in converting episodes. I had a self sustaining form of SVT that once initiated, would run on until I intervened or I guess dropped over.

Metoprolol come is both slow release and in normal release, the normal release is much lower cost in the USA and is called Metoprolol Tartarait (sp?). I used the slow release once a day for a few years but got approval to move to the regular release taken at 1/2 the former dose rate, but I take it twice a day. I do not suffer from SVT, but I do take BB.

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